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kids snacks

Hope everyone is having a wonderful summer so far! I absolutely cannot believe that the 4th of July is next weekend already! Time is really speeding by lately that’s for sure. Even so, I am super excited for the 4th!

We decided to make some homemade popsicles because…why not?! Red, white and blue and extremely simple! No joke, I really just threw these together! So perfect if you want to make something homemade but quick and easy.

4th of July Firecracker Popsicles!

All I did to make these was slice up strawberries into slices and small bites and add them to a popsicle mold along with some blueberries. You can add however much fresh fruit that you want to be in your popsicles. Don’t forget to add your popsicle sticks or whatever you want to use for a handle! Then I added sprite to fill everything in between!

Wasn’t really sure if these would turn out but they were way good! My son is obsessed with blueberries so these were a hit! Try them out! Super easy and fun for the kiddos 😛

Babies eating solids, toddlers and kids on up!! It’s sometimes a struggle to make a healthy meal first thing in the morning. If your child is anything like my son, he wants food RIGHT when he wakes up. Gee….I wonder where he gets that from 😉 So this was my attempt at giving myself some motivation to switch it up with healthy options. It’s so easy to just grab a yogurt or make a quick piece of buttered toast, which I’m learning is just going to have to be okay sometimes! But I also want to make an effort to give my son healthy eating habits.

It can be hard serving kids healthy meals when they are picky! Especially toddlers who love something one day and are totally disgusted by the exact same thing the next! My son is so hard to feed sometimes. One night he CHOWED down on sesame chicken, white rice and crab rangoons (I was shocked to say the least!) and the next night turned his nose up over simple spaghetti. Anyway…I do my best with feeding him healthy meals as much as I can!

What’s nice about these breakfast ideas is that they are really simple! Nothing too complicated or time consuming here!

Simple Breakfasts:

1) Simple buttered toast with slices of avocado.

One of the easiest! My go-to breakfast with my son.

2) Breakfast pancake muffins with grapes.

These pancake muffins were so easy to make and you can make them up ahead of time, stick them in the fridge or freezer and simply pop one out anytime you want! To see my recipe for them click HERE. You can add in anything you want such as blueberries, banana, spinach, etc.

3) Oatmeal and blueberries.

Bananas are a great add-in as well along with some cinnamon. Another one of my son’s favorites. He’s OBSESSED with blueberries. I prefer using plain cooked rolled oats versus instant oatmeal and just adding in whatever I want.

4) Scrambled eggs and kiwi.

Also quick and easy!

5) Peanut toast and oranges

Make faces or fun pictures out of food to make it look more fun and appealing! I look forward to my son actually being old enough to appreciate fun things like this! 😛

6) Pineapple shaped pancakes w/ chocolate chips and bananas

Obviously they don’t have to be pineapple shaped! But have fun with it and make pancakes into shapes or characters! This is definitely not a talent of mine. I’ve seen videos where people make faces or detailed images with pancakes…crazy!

7) Eggs (switch it up from scrambled!) with cantaloupe and pineapple!

8) Avocado toast and yogurt

If you’re using an avocado that is in a really soft stage (or you can just mash it up) its perfect for spreading on toast. It’s considered a healthy fat and a super food!

9) Strawberries and pancakes!

Clearly I just like making faces out of food! I think I’m still a kid myself! Switch it up with waffles too! Add fruit or shredded spinach for added nutrients as well.

Another fantastic option…Smoothies!!! Here are some great smoothie recipes!

Okay, it has definitely been way too long since I have done any blog posts! It is so difficult to keep up with everything but I’m doing my very best! I’ve really been focusing on my new Etsy shop lately, however, I really enjoy the blog so I want to keep it up to date as best I can!

As I have mentioned previously, I am probably going to be going crazy with making all different kinds of homemade gummy bears and fruit snacks since it was such a hit with my son! Such a perfect snack and a much healthier alternative to store bought.

These orange gummy bears are exactly as it sounds, full of orange goodness! I thought they tasted great and so did my son!

How to make:

Homemade Orange Gummy Bears

Use:

– 1/2 Cup orange puree (use 1 large orange to get approximately this amount)

– 1/2 Cup Orange juice

– 3 Tbsp powdered gelatin

– 1 Tbsp honey

Peel and slice the orange and blend well in the blender. No need to add any liquid since there is already enough liquid in it to puree it well. Measure out 1/2 cup of the puree and set aside. Heat juice along with gelatin in a small saucepan for about 5 minutes while stirring. Do not bring to a boil. Add juice mixture to the puree slowly while stirring. Add 1 Tbsp honey and stir it in well. You could add any other add ins you would like as well such as chia seeds for example! Poor into a pan wide enough so that the gelatin mixture is fairly thin. An 8×8 pan works well. Let mixture set in the refrigerator for at least 15 minutes. Cut into gummy bear shapes or any other small cookie cutter shapes you want!

That’s it! Quick and easy. Best of all, this recipe just uses honey for a sweetener to make it that much more healthier for those little tummies! Remember not to give honey to babies under one year old.

My new thing to make lately is homemade hummus. Which is weird because…I don’t really like hummus. But my son does and if he likes something that is healthy and will actually eat it then heck yes I’m making it! He will pretty much eat anything if it can go on a cracker. Hummus is really good for you and has protein. This is awesome for little ones who don’t get a lot of protein. Sawyer loved the plain hummus I made so I thought adding avocados would make it that much better!

This recipe is super simple! All you really need are the ingredients and a blender! Boom…done! This particular recipe also makes quite a lot so if you don’t eat a whole lot of hummus you may want to half it. It lasts about a week, after that starts to turn a bit brown.

What you need:

– 2 Cans Garbanzo Beans (also known as chick peas)

– 2 Avocados

– 2 Cloves Garlic

– 3 Tbsp avocado oil

-1 Tbsp Lemon Juice

– 1 tsp Cumin

– 3/4 Cup water

– tsp salt

Rinse garbanzo beans. If you really have a lot of free time then you could consider peeling the garbanzo beans. I didn’t do this since it is a bit tedious but I have heard that it can make a big difference in making your hummus really smooth. Add everything to the blender and blend well. Add more water if you want it creamier.

Back to smoothie-making for me! I have gotten so much use out of that Sili Squeeze I got to be able to easily feed my 1 year old smoothies. Definitely got my money’s worth out of that one. He absolutely loves smoothies and loves using it! Except for the fact that I still am not at the point where I can just give it to him and walk away or else he would just squeeze it eeeverywhere! So I still just hold it for him but it’s still way more convenient than using a spoon or just a regular cup and straw.

This smoothie isn’t just for babies and kids…I thought it was delicious too! Make a whole blender full and you could share it with the little ones 🙂 And since there is kale in it, even though it looks and sounds so unappetizing, you really don’t taste it so it is super healthy too!! All I could taste was blueberry, pear and yogurt goodness! I used 100% pure pomegranate juice for my liquid, which also has many health benefits.

How to make:

Blueberry-Pear Smoothie

– 1 Pear

– 1/2 Cup Blueberries

– 1 Stalk Kale

– 1/2 Cup Yogurt (When making this for my son I used Stonyfield YoTot Whole Milk Blueberry Yogurt)

– 1/2 Cup Pomegranate Juice

– Handful of Ice

Make sure to wash off fruit and kale. Peel and core the pear. Add everything to the blender and blend well adding more pomegranate juice if you need more liquid.

This tastes so amazing! I really think that blueberry and pear is a great combination! If you have younger babes, check out my Blueberry-Pear baby food puree on my Homemade Baby Purees page. I made this a while back when my son was still itty bitty and he loved that combo even then too!

Any sort of snack that is an easy grab n’ go snack or something that I can simply give my son without having to feed it to him has become a staple in our house! The homemade gummy bears that I made a few weeks ago was a complete success! My son loved them and the great thing is that they don’t have a ton of added sugar or artificial ingredients like store bought gummy bears or any other sort of fruit snack. In fact, they’re purely fresh fruit puree, juice, gelatin, honey and any other healthy ingredients you may want to add in! So needless to say, you can expect that I am going to have fun with this and experiment with different flavors 😛

I whipped up these banana-coconut gummy bears at the same time I made my strawberry-pomegranate gummy bears and am finally finding the time to write about it! Find the strawberry-pomegranate gummy bears HERE if you are interested.

These actually became somewhat of a joke in our house since my husband and I were digging into them just as much…they are quite addicting!

How to make:

Banana/Coconut Gummy Bears

Ingredients:

-1/2 Cup pureed bananas

-1/2 Cup Pineapple – Coconut water (plain coconut water would work just fine).

-1 Tbsp Honey

-3 Tbsp Gelatin powder

Add 1-2 bananas to the blender (depending on how big your bananas are and about how much will make 1/2 cup pureed) and puree until very smooth. Add a small amount of water if needed to puree smoothly. Cook coconut water and gelatin powder in a saucepan over low heat until the powder has dissolved (4-5 minutes) while stirring. Do not let mixture come to a boil. After the powder has dissolved take the liquid off of the heat and slowly add it to the banana puree while stirring. Add honey and stir until combined. Pour the mixture into a pan or gummy bear molds. If you use a pan you want to use a size that will make it so the liquid is fairly shallow. An 8×8 or 9×9 inch pan would work well.

I did find that these did not last as long as the other gummy bears I had made. Bananas kind of get gross if left out so I suppose the same things happens when in gummy bears! They last about a week or less in an air tight container in the fridge.

Okay, so I can’t really take credit for this one. My husband is actually the one who whipped this one up!

A little while back Sawyer loved garbanzo beans, LOVED them! He would shove them in his mouth one right after the other. Of course, soon after that came to a halt and he now refuses to eat them. He may try it at first but then spits it right out with a disgusted look. So I don’t know what happened but regardless, I had a few cans of chick peas lying around. My husband had the brilliant idea to make homemade hummus. Okay I am going to come clean and admit that since I’ve never even eaten hummus I didn’t even know that it was made primarily from chick peas!! Maybe I’m the only one but this was news to me! So I didn’t realize it was so easy to make homemade.

This is perfect because our son, like many one year olds I’m sure, won’t eat a whole lot of meat or protein. So this is perfect for a little extra protein. If it goes on a cracker, my son will eat it! Crackers are his absolute favorite!

How to make:

Super Simple Hummus:

1 Can Garbanzo beans

2 Tbsp olive oil

2 Tbsp Lemon Juice

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp salt

1/4 C water

Drain and rinse garbanzo beans. This next step isn’t necessary but to make it even creamier peel the garbanzo beans. Blend all ingredients in a food processor or blender.

I, myself am not a huge fan of the taste of chick peas so hummus really isn’t my favorite. Hummus is really good for you though so I did try to see if my son liked it and he eats it on crackers! Success!

I actually thought of this by accident but it turned out to be an awesome new snack idea that is really easy to make! It started with me making him tortilla sandwich rolls the other day. I was using these tortilla shells from the bakery section and they are huge! So for him I of course just needed to use a small portion of it. I didn’t want to waste the rest so I got the idea to try making tortilla chips since I have never tried it yet before anyway! So…why not cut them into cute, fun little shapes and make them kid friendly! A new option for a quick grab snack!

Chips are not always the healthiest of options so I wanted to make these at least “healthier” if possible. So I decided to use avocado oil and just a very small amount of salt. I would like to try these with coconut oil as well, I’m not sure how they would turn out or if they would be much different at all.

Spinach Tortilla Chips

How I made them:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut tortilla shells using mini cookie cutters. If you wanted to just make regular chips, just cut them into triangles. Lay them out on a cookie sheet and brush both sides with avocado oil. Sprinkle with salt. Bake in the oven for about 12 minutes.

That’s it!

See what I mean?! Super easy! I literally did this while Sawyer was in his high chair and on the brink of whining for his lunch. So if I can get it done before that, that’s really saying something 😉

Search Whippersnappers

I am a stay-at-home mommy to a wonderful 8 month old boy, Sawyer. I am a Navy wife and we are currently stationed in South Carolina. I decided that I want to share my ideas, homemade baby food recipes, kids crafts & activities as well as other kiddie shenanigans. I hope to have my homemade baby/children's clothing shop started in the near future!

Disclaimer:

This is a personal weblog and for entertainment purposes only. Information provided on this blog is at your own risk. Unless otherwise stated, I am the copyright holder of all photos and material on this blog, which cannot be used to reprint or publish without my written consent.